Vulnerability Porn 🍆 (don’t check my browser history)

Notice the waning societal intolerance for gender roles, especially masculine ones?

We’re all kinda focused on the problems rather than presenting solutions.

“Strength in speaking”

I agree with the sentiment, but it’s not enough when we overvalue speaking at the sacrifice of listening.

Those traits with loud voices are deemed the more favourable and encouraged to get on in life.

It’s extroverts that thrive, no?

We want men to be more vulnerable, but the majority have had a lifetime encouraged to suppress that vulnerability.

It’s “weak.”

“Effeminate”

They want to do better, maybe, but then do ALL their partners want them to be vulnerable, and are they equipped to listen and appropriately respond?

What even is passive listening, and are we listening or waiting for an opportunity to speak?

As someone relatively attuned with my emotions and quite aware of open and honest communication, I can assure you my wife isn’t always grateful for that.

Maybe they don’t have the vocabulary and can’t articulate their feelings and what they’re experiencing.

Restrictive emotionality because, after all, many of them are:

“Toxic men,” outwardly projecting toxic masculinity due to their male privilege if they’re not man-splaining.

And of course, that’s true of some men.

Maybe the majority.

But we daren’t say “not all men.”

I do get it!

We don’t want to diminish (and nor should we) the experiences women face (and for much longer). Still, I feel feminism is going to struggle to move forwards.

Equality is unlikely to be achieved anytime soon if it’s not a plight fought by both sides. The archaic traits associated with ‘alphas’ aren’t addressed either.

Can we be equally passionate about a lot of this language that dehumanises men?

Unnecessarily divisive if we encourage men to participate in this conversation?

Many men experience intense strain in interpreting their negative emotions, including shame, meaningfully.

Sometimes they do share, and this is the problem I sometimes find myself in with a day and age of performative vulnerability.

Vulnerability porn (don’t check my browser history) or ‘sadfishing’ for likes and follows stems from low self-esteem, loneliness, narcissism, and Machiavellianism.

Vulnerability is weaponised to garner sympathy or attention.

Using it and abusing vulnerability strategically makes me feel all sorts of uncomfortable.

How do you decipher between genuinely wanting to resonate and connect and being vulnerable without oversharing and “attention-seeking”?

Is there anything wrong with attention-seeking if someone feels alone?

There’s some legitimacy in attention-seeking because sometimes those in the deepest darkest depths of despair only have that.

Are they then the ones we reflect on?

“I wish they had said something.”

That post sharing something quite intimate and personal hangover?

“Shit, did I say too much, they proably think _____________”

Understanding the motives of others is challenging, especially as many don’t understand their motivations.

But there always is, and that’s generally for anything posted on social media.

They occasionally operate quite covertly to the point we deceive ourselves.

Are they genuinely highlighting essential and sensitive issues or a means of accumulating social currency and a foot in the door of activism?

Exploit or promote.

The easiest and quickest fix is to appear virtuous and advocate raising awareness without doing anything.

I don’t profess to have all the answers, by the way, but I felt it worthwhile to provoke some thought because of its arduous muddy terrain.

Most don’t have the necessary communication skills, and it takes practice.

It’s not overnight.

Emotional granularity.

What’s that?!

They need a diverse friendship group too.

I have many amazing friends, but different people in our lives have different strengths.

Some of my friends and family are incredible people, just not the right people to share certain things.

The patriarchal system is just as harmful to modern men by confining them to a system they did not create and holding them accountable for the misdeeds of their forefathers.

Broad, sweeping, judgemental strokes are a threat to women and men.

Traditional masculinity hinders men from seeking help.

“Push that shit down, mate, until it manifests as a stomach ulcer.”

Being vulnerable isn’t a thing, but it still seems a mystery that many internalise.

They then wonder why it presents anger, aggression, violence, addiction, and suicidality.

Go figure.

We advocate inclusivity and reject gendered language except just a few above.

Gendered attitudes and expectations hurt men too.

“Provider”

“Protector”

Men are held responsible for their innate traits instead of identifying the worst parts of society that impact all men (and women).

Boys and men are sometimes shamed because of their gender too.

So yeah, raising awareness is good; encouraging people to speak is helpful.

Still, these complexities won’t be resolved in insta-therapy soundbites, selectively and unhelpful gendered descriptors, and will be hard work.

I’m trying to create a non-judgemental safe space for this discussion.

Still, there’s a risk of rejection from other men and repelling women for what’s sometimes suggested as men having ulterior motives.

Virtue signaling or the more sinister and stealth misogyny in which men feel they need to rescue women.

Do you know what… it sometimes is that too.

I had two comments along the lines of “sorry for oversharing” from people I work with over the last week.

This tells me I need you to make it more evident that there’s a safe space for open dialogue, and I’m always more than happy to listen.

This also made me think of how warped our societal perception of what it truly is to be vulnerable with another means.

How that pendulum swing means many of us think we’re “too much” to deal with when we’re experiencing adversity.

Who do you call when you’re at your lowest?